Hokkien Mee or Prawn Mee




Ingredients

1 kg medium sized prawns (get the reddish type with the big heads - 'mah ha' as they called it here)
buy as needed kangkong
1/2 kg pork bones or (ketam bunga substitute for our muslim friends)
the soup is clearer with crabs!
buy as needed lean pork (fish cake for our muslim friends)
600 gm (one pack) yellow noodles
1 pack rice vermicelli (bihun)
300 gms bean sprouts
1 pack fried shallots ( preferbly fried your own using rose shallots, more fragrant)
1 nos. yam bean (sengkuang)
one lump rock sugar
as needed hard boiled egg

For the sambal

250 gms chilly paste (chilly boh)
1 small pkt chilly powder
2 small slices 'belacan'
100 gms dried shrimp (har mai)
to taste sugar
to taste salt
to taste MSG (if you want)

First prepare the sambal. Grind the dried shrimp in a dry blender (I don't know what that thingy is called) and roast the belacan till fragrant. Put 250 gms. cooking oil in the wok. Cook the grinded dried shrimp till fragrant and add in the belacan. Add in the chilly boh and stir continously and then add the chilly powder. The chilly powder will give the sambal a nice red colour. Lower the heat and stir occasionally so as not to let it get burnt. Cook until a layer of oil forms on the surface. Add in 2 tbsp. of sugar and a dash of MSG. Then add salt to taste.

Heat up water (amount as desired) in a stock pot. When the water boils put in the prawns. Once the prawns surface to the top, scoop up the prawns.Leave aside the prawns. Add the peeled and sliced thickly yam bean and pork bones (or ketam bunga) and let it boil on high heat. Peel the prawns and put put the peeled prawns into the fridge. In another wok, heat up oil. Scoop 3 ladle ful of the sambal and fry the prawn shells and heads in it. Fry on high heat till really cooked, almost burnt. Transfer everything into the boiling stock. Let it boil and lower the heat when it boils and boil for one and half hours. Add MSG, sugar and salt as desired. Add in the sambal till you get the desired taste. Before shutting off the heat cook the lean pork or pork ribs if you wish and take it after it is cooked.

Scald the noodle, bihun, kangkong and bean sprout and put it into a bowl. Garnish with prawns, sliced lean pork and pork ribs (or sliced fish cake) and hard boiled egg. Pour the soup over and add in the fried shallots.

Enjoy.

ps.For most hawker, they will grind the fried prawn heads and shells to extract the most out of them but it will cloud the soup

Actually very hard to explain without graphics. I have notice that even chicken rice sellers chopped it differently. For home consumption, I think how we chop is not important but how we present is more important. As for commercial, it is important as it will determine the profits for the operator. I will describe very briefly with my own graphic.

From a chicken we can have 2 plates of drumstick rice - RM5.50 x 2 , 2 plates of thigh meat ( Kai yee tou )- RM4.50 x 2 , 2 plates of shoulder meat ( kai pui chek also sometimes serves as kai yee tou ) - RM4.50 x 2 , 2 plates of chicken wing rice ( kai yik ) - RM4 x 2 and from the two portions of chicken breast and the two fillets, we can divide it into 5 plates of chicken breast rice (kai huung yuk fan ) - RM4.00 x 5 . Altogether a total of 13 plates if totals up comes to RM57.00 per chicken of 2kgs. This includes the fragrant rice, the chilly sauce, the ginger sauce, the soup, rental labour which actually does not amount to much profit.



Slit the chicken at the centre of breast and then chop as near as the backbone as possible to divide the chicken into two. Cut the backbone out and discard. Take one side of the two halves and cut the wing out with a little breast attached. Cut out the drumstick but leave the thigh attached to the carcass. Divide the remaining lenghtwise separating the breast meat from the shoulder and thigh parts. Now take the breast meat and pull it apart from the bone. Dig out the fillet attached to the bone. Flatten the fillet a bit and chop. Pick up the chopped m,eat with your cleaver and place it on the plate. Slice the breast meat into to portions to thin out the meat. Chop the portion without the skin first and as before place the meat neatly on top of the fillet. Now chop the skinned portion and also place it neatly on top of the former portion.

Chop up the other half in the same way and now you have all the breast meat in the cneter of the plate. Then chop the thigh and shoulder section equally and also arrange it at the side of the breast meat. There's a bone in the center of the thigh that needs to be taken out because usually there's still blood here. Chicken is 90 percent cooked to be perfect. Do the same on the other side and then lastly chop up the wings and place it at the side. Try to arrange the chicken las where their parts should be, sometimes even the head in some festival meals. Garnish with chopped spring onions, coriader leaves and julienne red chillies.

I find multi function ovens, (Panasonic even has steaming functions) not really functionable!!!

In microwave/convection ovens, the color of the cake never comes out right, you can but you have to experiment with the settings and all the recipes get haywire. In conventional ovens, you just have to readjust your oven temperature with times in the recipes and that is for once only because by that time you will understand the characteristics of your own oven. If you are really serious about baking, I suggest getting those stand alone ovens (as said by a forummer earlier). Europa is now on their own after splitting from Zanussi but both perform OK.

I have a Zanussi but the wattage is 3.5KWs and I have to change the ELCB to handle the wattage. But favourable point is the temperature is stable and heats up fast. The others I have seen is about 2.2KWs only. Suprisingly my friend's Singer is quite OK, a variation of Europa actually. Off course if you can afford, get those by Fagor and Indesit, but they are mostly built in types. Don't go for Butterfly though.

IMHO I rather pay RM1500 for a conventional oven and spend another RM300 for a microwave oven separately. What do you use a microwave for usually? Heating, defrosting and Maggi mee,

Beside Kinta market, along the same row as the vegetarian chap fan, almost to the other end, there's a Nestle's sole distributor. I am sure he stocks this chicken stock, by the cartons.

Herbs from C.Highlands Most of the herbs are grown in Genting farms, like thyme, oregano, Italian parsley, fennel etc. Only herbs I know grown in C.Highlands is parsley, coriander and spring onions. Where did you buy them?

Those salads and herbs that you see in Jaya Jusco are all grown in Genting. You can see the nursery half way to the peak with a signboard but they don't sell it there. They just supply.

It's quite common. It's available in most baking sections of hyper market. I think most of them are repacked in those transparent throw away tupperwares. It's white in colour.

Shortening has the same quality as margarine or butter and in pastry or cake baking, it serves the same purpose. The taste will differ though from ewach other and off course real butter will be the best tasting ones. Some are vegetarian therefore the need for shortening.

"Shortening is a type of solid fat that is made from vegetable oils, such as soybean and cottonseed oil. Shortening seems to get its name from the fact that it shortens gluten strands in wheat by adding fat. Since it is 100%, as opposed to the 80% fat content of butter or lard, it results in a very tender baked good. It is frequently seen in baking recipes, although it is rarely used in other areas of cooking."

Basically the same as local 'tang hoon' except they are made coarser hence the bite is crunchier and you can bite into it rather than slurping straight down the throat. The dry raw ingredient seems darker in colour and this is due to the purity of rice flour, so I guess their taste should be better. They are expensive though. Can be found in Korean village in Ampang.

You need cooking chocolate to start with. Then you add milk, sugar, cream or whatever you wish to personalised your creations. You can find the cooking chocolates in baking shops, either normal, white or bitter. There are 2 shops on the same row in Taman Megah, PJ. It is on the same row ( last row ) as Fatty Crab (now I don't know what the crab is called )

You can also make Power Bars yourself, they sell dried apricots, muesli, sunflower seeds etc there too.

This post has been edited by etigge: Jun 4 2011, 07:20 PM

Just to add taste. Too much the chocolate won't harden.

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Added on June 5, 2011, 10:59 amYou can good ideas from YouTube. Gordon Ramsey has a few killer recipes in there. Just search for Gordon Ramseys pasta, saddle lamb,etc.

This post has been edited by etigge: Jun 5 2011, 10:59 AM

Those cooking chocolate are not in the fridge in the first place when you buy. They are just sitting on the shelf. Just don't add too much liquid to dilute it. In the natural form they are hard, actually very hard, needs heat to melt it. Expiry date wise, I dunno worrr. You made it so we won't know when it will expire Just like MacDonalds ice cream, they dip the ice cream in the chocolate and the chocolate hardens almost instantly. After melting and fine tuning the taste and flavour of the chocolate mixture, make sure you have enough time to mould or cover your nuts or rice crispies or whatever before they hardens.

Good for you. Cooking is actually very simple but you need to be passionate about it.

Most user wash their teflon pans immedietely after cooking and this is a big No, No. You have to let it cool down first which is why pasta restaurants have a lot of this pans and they wash it later. That's why busy commercial kitchens avoids non stick pan, they only use it for certain purposes. Cast iron is still the best. I think not using metallic utensils, you should know right? The high heat and sudden temperature cool down will affect the coating not to mention it might warp the pans if you buy a cheap one.

The green pan you mentioned is made of granny smith's apples extract and after staining they won't come off. According to my wife, she won't encourage buying it as customers complains that it sticks even for non stick that it claims. I will listen to her as she is working for a reknown pots and pans company.

Gourmet is too expensive for its price. If you really want nice ones, I saw a few good ones in Viva, the new home shopping center in Jalan Loke Yew. Just have a look there but don't buy as they are priced too high there. From there get an idea and head to Jalan Pasar where they have more shops but only a few selling stuffs for commercial kitchens. I like pan with handles where I can put it directly into the oven. They last wothout bothering about the handles get burned or loose screws.

The first maker of non-stick, Tefal is a good choice but price can be a bit prohibitive, real ones. They also have cheaper ones but quality is not like the real ones. The other brand Supor is also marketed by the same company.

Actually not Jalan Pasar but Jalan Pasar Baru. The shops along the fishes and aquarium stalls, former Hai-O but the other end facing the Pudu Market itself.

The important thing is trying and trying. You can never expect to get it right at the first time. Cooking is practice and needs lots of it. Like they say, "Why does the red Indian is always successful in their rain dance?" Because they danced till it rains. So cook it till you get it right.

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Added on June 29, 2011, 3:56 pm Most important for using casr iron cooking utensils is NEVER WASH WITH COOKING DETERGENT! It will rust. Usually the msot preferred method is let some water boil together with the stubborn stains until it comes off. If you see those cast iron woks that CKT people uses they are just wash with high heat and water only. It makes the cast iron wok kind of oily and shiny. Food don't stick on it either.

Although I use a lot of Tefal products and the teflon coating is the best, I still use a little bit of oil in my cooking. Say Tefal just released their latest pots and pans using Inox steel. Very nice

This post has been edited by etigge: Jun 29 2011, 03:56 PM

Thank you for revealing your secret recipe. I think the ratio of the pasta in relation to the condiments is too wide. It is available in some of our Italian restaurants BTW. Here,

To fry fish either deep fried (yau cham) or plain fried (kon chin), the most important is the oil must be really hot, smoking hot in fact. If it is not the skin will stick to the wok. The effect is to harden the skin first. Once the fish is in the oil, lower the heat. The fish also must not be moved about during frying or you will break up the fish as the skin has not turn crispy. If you flip the fish and finds the skin sticking , leave it and wait for a while. If it is cooked it will come off. If you want to flavour the oil, maybe to get rid of the fishy scent, you can saute them simultaneously but usually with ginger or maybe onions but not garlic as by the time the fish is cooked the garlic will be burnt and becomes bitter. Leave the cooked fish on a colander on a plate and leave it for 5 minutes so the oil will flow down into the plate if you don't want the fish to be oily. To me I like to add soya sauce to the oil, it makes my rice really nice to eat. To make it nicer like Ipoh's style, deep fry some dried prawns (har mai) and some julienne ginger and sprinkle on top of the fish together with coriander leaves. YUMMY 'Kon Chin Ma Yau' my favourite.



This post has been edited by etigge: Jul 17 2011, 09:34 AM

It's called bean curd sheets. Sold mostly in wet markets. Just ask the bean curd seller. Make sure you wipe it with a damp cloth (clean one lah off course) to lake it pliable before wrapping. Can also make 'pok pok chui' like those used in noodles.